Tendulkar claims first-ever People's Choice Award

Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar walks the red carpet at the International Cricket Council (ICC) award 2010, in Bangalore on October 6, 2010. The ICC and the Federation of International Cricketers' Association (FICA) organised this event to recognize the achievment of the cricketers on the field in various categorys. (AFP)

India’s cricketing icon Sachin Tendulkar was on Wednesday named Cricketer of the Year at the prestigious LG ICC Awards, held at a glittering ceremony in Bengaluru, India.

Tendulkar was also named as the first recipient of the inaugural LG People’s Choice Award and was named in both the Test and ODI Teams of the Year.

The Indian superstar was voted to the award by the general public and beat off strong competition for the inaugural award from South Africa’s AB de Villiers, Sri Lanka’s Mahela Jayawardena, Australia’s Michael Hussey and England’s Andrew Strauss.

This award, which was included for the first time, was chosen by cricket fans around the world, over the course of four weeks. Tendulkar was presented the award by Dr. Verma who is the Chief Operating Officer of LG India.

Tendulkar was joined on the winners’ list by team-mate Virender Sehwag, who took the Test Player of the Year award while South Africa batsman AB de Villiers was named ODI Player of the Year. England’s Steven Finn claimed his first ever ICC award when he was named Emerging Player of the Year.

Meanwhile, Australia’s Shelley Nitschke became the second Australian to win the Women’s Cricketer of the Year Award (former captain Karen Rolton took the prize in 2006) and Netherlands’ Ryan ten Doeschate was named the Associate and Affiliate Player of the Year gong, an award recognising the contribution of the teams below Full Member status are making in the world of cricket.

In total there were nine individual awards handed out, as well as the Spirit of Cricket Award and the two ICC Teams of the Year – for Tests and ODIs.

Aleem Dar of the Emirates Elite Panel of ICC Umpires won the Umpire of the Year Award for the second year in a row, while New Zealand took the Spirit of Cricket Award as it did in 2004 and in 2009.

The Twenty20 International Performance of the Year was won by New Zealand’s Brendon McCullum who became the third-ever recipient of the honour. McCullum took the trophy following his spectacular 116 not out off 56 balls against Australia in Christchurch in February of this year.

Tendulkar has become the seventh player to win the coveted Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy beating off stiff competition to take the award from fellow short-list nominees Sehwag, Hashim Amla of South Africa and England’s Graeme Swann.

The mercurial batsman follows in the footsteps of India’s Rahul Dravid (2004), Andrew Flintoff of England and South Africa’s Jacques Kallis (joint winners in 2005), Ricky Ponting of Australia (2006 and 2007), Shivnarine Chanderpaul (2008) and Mitchell Johnson (2009) to take the top award.

“It’s fantastic to win this award, I’m really excited to have won two awards and this last season for the entire team has been really special.

“I think right from the start of the season when we won in Sri Lanka and I scored a hundred in the finals and from there on the season took off for us. We became number one in the Test rankings, something we all wanted to achieve and we’ve been able to maintain our performances in the last 10 months.

“To win both of these awards tonight, Cricketer of the Year and the LG People’s Choice Award, is special and it’s the game’s way of appreciating someone’s performance. It feels great to have two trophies in front of me and I am feeling very proud and happy.”

ICC President Sharad Pawar congratulating Tendulkar on his victory said: “Sachin Tendulkar has been the focal point of Indian cricket now for some 20 years and over the past year his superb batting and hard work has continued to illustrate his importance in the India team batting line-up. Sachin’s statistics for the last 12 months show how worthy a winner of this accolade he is.”

During the voting period, the 37-year-old from Mumbai played in 10 Test matches, striking 1,064 runs, including six centuries, at an average of 81.84.

Tendulkar also played in 17 ODI matches in the time, smashing his way to 914 runs at an average 65.28 in a period that also included the master batsman’s record-breaking double-century against South Africa in Gwalior.

The right-handed batsman currently sits third in the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for Test batsmen and is 10th in the ODI rankings.

Sehwag beat off competition from team-mate Tendulkar and the South African duo of Dale Steyn and Amla to claim the first ICC award of his career.

He put in some remarkable performances with the bat, making 1,282 runs with an impressive average of 85.46 in the 10 Test matches. He scored six centuries and four half-centuries during the period.

Upon collecting the ICC Test Player of the Year award from former West Indies bowler Courtney Walsh, the 31-year-old Sehwag said: “It’s fantastic to win the award to take over the title from Gautam Gambhir.

“I try to play the best I can in Test match cricket and play the same way I do in every format of the game.

“I’m a huge fan of Test cricket and I love to play it more than Twenty20 or one-day cricket and the game is something I love to play.”

De Villiers beat competition from Tendulkar and the Australia duo of Shane Watson and Ryan Harris to take the ICC ODI Player of the Year award.

He played 16 ODIs and scored 855 runs at an average of 71.25 and at a rate of 103.38 runs per 100 balls faced.

On receiving his first ever ICC award, de Villiers said: “I’ve really enjoyed this season and it’s great to have been named the ODI Cricketer of the Year.

“It’s a World Cup season and a World Cup is something we would love to win and we rate our chances pretty highly.”

De Villiers also features in the ODI Team of the Year and is the only South African in the side selected by the expert five-man panel.

McCullum’s knock came on February 28, a performance that included 12 fours and eight sixes. He then helped his side to victory when the match went down to a one-over eliminator to decide the result.

McCullum beat competition from Australia’s Michael Hussey for his 60 not out off 24 balls against Pakistan in the ICC World Twenty20 West Indies 2010 semifinal in St Lucia; South Africa’s Ryan McLaren for his 5-19 against West Indies in Antigua on 19 March 2010 and Sri Lanka’s Mahela Jaywardena for his two performances at the ICC World Twenty20 2010 – 100 off 64 balls against Zimbabwe in Guyana and 98 not out in 56 balls against West Indies in Bridgetown.

The 29-year-old said upon hearing of his victory: “That score is my highest in a Twenty20 International and on the day everything just seemed to go right for me. I feel honoured that the voting academy felt my performance was the best amongst some other extremely strong candidates for the award in the form of Mahela, Mike and Ryan.”

The Twenty20 International Performance of the Year was one of 12 individual and team honours handed out during the LG ICC Awards in association with FICA. The event, held at The Grand Castle, Bengaluru recognised cricket’s star performers over a 12-month period until August 10.

MS Dhoni was named the captain of the Test team of the year, which included Sehwag, Kumar Sangakkara, Graeme Swann, Tendulkar, Hashim Amla, Simon Katich, Dale Steyn, Jacques Kallis, James Anderson and Doug Bollinger.

Ricky Ponting was captain of the ODI team of the year, leading a team comprising Tendulkar, Shane Watson, Michael Hussey, de Villiers, Paul Collingwood, Dhoni, Daniel Vettori, Stuart Broad, Bollinger and Ryan Harris.

England fast bowler Steven Finn has won the ICC Emerging Player of the Year award at the LG ICC Awards ceremony in Bengaluru.

Finn’s best bowling figures in an innings during the period came against Bangladesh when he took 5-42 in 10 overs in the second Test at Old Trafford. He had earlier taken another five-for, also against Bangladesh, but this time at Lord’s when he snapped up 5-87.

He was the top choice ahead of Pakistan’s Umar Akmal, Sri Lanka’s Angelo Matthews and Australia’s Tim Paine.

Receiving his award from West Indies bowler Joel Garner, Finn said: “It’s a great honour to win this an award I wasn’t expecting and I’m very pleased and honoured to be playing Test match cricket for my country.

“I’ve enjoyed the last few months representing my country and I hope it continues. Next up is the Ashes and I think we’re well prepared to win the series and saying that we’ve got a settled side ready to go for this winter.”

The cricketers were selected by a five-man ICC panel chaired by former West Indies captain and current chairman of the ICC Cricket Committee Clive Lloyd and includes former international players Angus Fraser of England, Matthew Hayden of Australia, Ravi Shastri of India and Zimbabwe’s Duncan Fletcher.